Displaying Compact and Expanded Data Items

Abstract

A system sends a search query to a search engine and receives from the search engine, responsive to the search query, a document comprising a first search result item and a second search result item. The system visually renders a portion that includes less than an entirety of the first search result item and includes the second search result item, where the portion is visually rendered in a region of the document. The system receives a selection of the first search result item from a user and visually expands the region of the document to a size sufficient to render an entirety of the first search result item based on the selection. The system visually renders the entirety of the first search result item within the expanded region of the document. Data supplied from the esp@cenet database—Worldwide

1 . A method, comprising:
 searching a corpus of documents based on a search query to identify first and second documents that match the search query;   extracting a first snippet of content from the first document;   extracting a second snippet of content from the second document;   generating a search result document that includes the first and second snippets;   designating a first portion of the first snippet that can be displayed within a region in a user interface that will visually render the search result document; and   designating a second portion of the first snippet that should not have any visual indication or reference in the user interface that will visually render the search result document unless the first snippet is selected by a user via the user interface;   receiving a selection of the first snippet from the user;   visually expanding the region of the first snippet based on the selection; and   visually rendering the second portion of the first snippet within the expanded region of the first snippet.   
   
   
       2 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the first snippet is selected by clicking on the first snippet or by moving a cursor over the first snippet. 
   
   
       3 . The method of  claim 1 , further comprising:
 designating a first portion of the second snippet that can be displayed in the user interface that will visually render the search result document; and   designating a second portion of the second snippet that should not have any visual indication or reference in the user interface that will visually render the search result document unless the second snippet is selected by a user via the user interface.   
   
   
       4 . A method, comprising:
 sending a search query to a search engine;   receiving from the search engine, responsive to the search query, a document comprising a first data item and a second data item;   visually rendering a region of the document that comprises at least a portion of a snippet of the first data item and visually rendering at least a portion of the second data item;   receiving a selection of the first data item from a user;   visually expanding the region of the document based on the selection; and   visually rendering additional portions of the first data item within the expanded region of the document.   
   
   
       5 . The method of  claim 4 , wherein the first data item is selected by clicking on the first data item or by moving a cursor over the first data item. 
   
   
       6 . The method of  claim 4 , wherein expanding the region comprises:
 displacing the region a sufficient distance to visually render the entirety of the snippet of the first data item within the region.   
   
   
       7 . The method of  claim 4 , wherein expanding the region comprises:
 expanding the region in two dimensions on the document to include the entirety of the first data item.   
   
   
       8 . The method of  claim 4 , wherein the first data item comprises a snippet of content of a first document whose content matches the search query. 
   
   
       9 . The method of  claim 8 , wherein the second data item comprises a snippet of content of a second document whose content matches the search query. 
   
   
       10 . A method, comprising:
 visually displaying data within a data item in a document, wherein the data item includes elided data not visually displayed in the document;   receiving a selection of the data item from a user;   removing the visually displayed data within the data item and placing an animation object within the data item based on the selection of the data item;   animating the animation object such that the animation object expands to fill a space in the document sufficient to visually display the data and the elided data; and   removing the animation object and visually displaying the data and the elided data within the expanded space in the document.   
   
   
       11 . The method of  claim 10 , wherein the data item is selected by clicking on the data item or by moving a cursor over the data item. 
   
   
       12 . The method of  claim 10 , wherein animating the animation object such that the animation object expands to fill the space in the document comprises:
 expanding the animation object initially quickly and then progressively slowing the expansion down until the animation object fills the space in the document.   
   
   
       13 . A method, comprising:
 visually displaying at least a portion of a snippet of first data within a first data item in a document, wherein the first data item includes elided data not visually displayed in the document;   receiving a selection of the first data item from a user;   enlarging the first data item in two dimensions in the document based on the selection of the first data item; and   visually displaying the first data and the elided data within the enlarged first data item.   
   
   
       14 . The method of  claim 13 , further comprising:
 visually displaying second and third data items adjacent the first data item; and   enlarging the second and third data items in the document based on the selection of the first data item, wherein the second and third data items are enlarged in the two dimensions less than the enlargement of the first data item.   
   
   
       15 . The method of  claim 13 , wherein the first data item is selected by clicking on the first data item or by moving a cursor over the first data item. 
   
   
       16 . A method, comprising:
 visually displaying first data within a first data item in a document, wherein the first data item includes elided data not visually displayed in the document and wherein the first data item includes active handles at one or more comers of the first data item;   receiving input from a user moving one of the active handles such that the first data item is expanded to a size sufficient to visually display the first data and the elided data; and   visually displaying the first data and the elided data within the expanded first data item.   
   
   
       17 . The method of  claim 16 , wherein the moving the one of the active handles comprises clicking on the one of the active handles and dragging the one of the active handles to expand the first data item. 
   
   
       18 - 21 . (canceled) 
   
   
       22 . A method, comprising:
 visually displaying first data within a data item in a document, wherein the data item includes first and second elided data not visually displayed in the document;   receiving a first selection of the data item from a user;   visually expanding the data item within the document to display the first data and the first elided data;   receiving a second selection of the data item from the user; and   visually expanding the data item within the document to display the first data, the first elided data and the second elided data.   
   
   
       23 . A method, comprising:
 visually displaying a list of data items in a document, wherein the list of data items comprises first and second data items and wherein the first data item includes elided data not visually displayed in the document;   receiving a selection of the first data item from a user; and   visually expanding the first data item within the document to display the elided data, wherein visually expanding the first data item displaces the second data item a distance downwards in the document.   
   
   
       24 . The method of  claim 23 , wherein the list of data items further includes a third data item and wherein visually expanding the first data item displaces the third data item the distance downwards in the document. 
   
   
       25 . A method, comprising:
 visually displaying first data of a data item in a document, wherein the data item includes multiple different segments of elided data not visually displayed in the document;   receiving a selection of the data item from a user; visually expanding the data item in the document to include the multiple segments of elided data at different locations in the document;   receiving a de-selection of the data item from the user; and   visually contracting the data item in the document to remove the multiple segments of elided data and to display only the first data.   
   
   
       26 - 27 . (canceled) 
   
   
       28 . A device comprising:
 means for sending a search query to a search engine;   means for receiving from the search engine, responsive to the search query, a document comprising a first data item and a second data item;   means for visually rendering a region of the document that comprises at least a portion of a snippet of the first data item and visually rendering at least a portion of the second data item outside the region;   means for receiving a selection of the first data item from a user;   means for visually expanding the region of the document based on the selection; and   means for visually rendering an additional portion of the first data item within the expanded region of the document.